Future Divine: Alpha
by Shadow Cain
Summary: After the events of OotP, Harry decides to make a few changes in his life. However, some people think that the change is a little too late. Unfortunately for Harry, they have the power to fix that, and decide to send along some help. AU, Time Travel, HP/?
1. Prologue

**AN:/ Alright! This is my first story, and I don't know how it's going to turn out. I have so many ideas bouncing around in my head, so this will probably end up a shambles, but let's see where it takes us.**

**The rating, whatever I set it as, is high as a precaution. I don't know how much input I'll have from friends, but any and all of it will be... teen, at the least.**

**Basically this sprung from the simple thought: What would it take to change Harry's life? So here we go!**

**Disclaimer: Alright, everyone knows how this goes, I don't own Harry Potter; I don't own the song SING by MCR; and I most certainly don't own any recognisable muggle tech.**

...

Prologue

Harry Potter lay on his bed in the smallest bedroom of Number Four, Privet Drive, staring at the ceiling. His chest rose and fell lightly, and he didn't look up as a white owl rustled in its cage. He didn't take any notice, either, as his Uncle Vernon snorted in the considerably larger room down the hall.

In other words, Harry Potter was asleep.

However, as the first rays of light began shining on the cookie-cutter houses that made Privet Drive, he jerked awake, his eyes wild, before slumping back down on the bed, a pained look crossing his face.

The veil had haunted his dreams again.

Every night as he fell asleep he would once again visit the Department of Mysteries. It wasn't always the same dream.

Sometimes he would see Hermione, her hair splayed around her head as she lay on the ground, Dolohov laughing in the background.

Sometimes it was Ron, the memory strands wrapping around his arms in a tight embrace, before moving up and over him, smothering him, falling away and leaving nothing left.

Occasionally it was a full-out fire fight, with Tonks falling to Bellatrix; Remus being slain by Wormtail; Kingsley and Moody being taken out by a full squad of Death Eaters; even Dumbledore, heroic leader of the light, being extinguished with a well-aimed curse from Voldemort.

But it always came back to the veil.

Harry sighed, before getting up and taking stock of his surroundings. His room was almost exactly the same as it had been the previous year when Tonks had entered it; completely and utterly trashed.

There were a few minor alterations, however. In the corner lay a small, portable laptop that he'd managed to snag from the trash after Dudley had thrown it out in disgust, declaring it to be 'completely out-of-date.' After reconnecting some of the wires, the laptop was up and running, and Harry had an instant connection to the wide world.

And that had flipped his whole life around.

After taking a trip to Diagon Alley via the Knight Bus (an experience he was not keen to repeat), he had managed to obtain a Wizcard from Gringotts. After some careful questioning - _What the hell is this thing‽_ - he had managed to deduce that this worked similarly to a muggle credit card, and could in fact be used in the muggle world. After being assured that the interest his trust vault alone made in a day would be enough to cover a week-long shopping spree, he went a little nuts.

He had installed iTunes, and had downloaded any song he found that sounded vaguely interesting. He had then ordered an iPod Touch, and downloaded all the best rated apps.

Of course, almost immediately he was bored of them, and had decided to simply use it to listen to music while he worked.

Speaking of which...

He jumped off his bed, snagged his iPod and headphones from the desk and ran into the bathroom to shower, before rushing back to his room, having forgotten to pick up a towel. He quickly dressed in his new clothes (another wild spending spree, this time at an out of the way mall).

A tight black T-shirt went on, followed by a dark grey hoodie. He slipped into a dark blue pair of skinny jeans and fastened his Nike Vandal Hi-tops. He popped the headphones into his ears and smiled slightly as one of his favourite songs came on.

_Sing it out  
>Boy you've got to see what tomorrow brings<br>Sing it out  
>Girl you've got to be what tomorrow needs<em>

Yes, he did. Everyone always wanted him to be there for them when the going got tough. Well, if the going could get tough, so could he.

_Sing it for the boys, sing it for the girls  
>Every time that you lose it sing it for the world<br>Sing it from the heart  
>Sing it till you're nuts<br>Sing it out for the ones that'll hate your guts_

Harry smiled slightly as he turned into the mall where he worked. He didn't hate anyone. Everyone just seemed to hate him. He could accept that, as long as they didn't seem surprised when he pulled that nice security rug out from under their feet, and let them fall onto the cold, harsh floor of reality.

_Sing it for the deaf  
>Sing it for the blind<br>Sing about everyone that you left behind_

He turned into the music store where he worked behind the counter, and smiled, nodding his head in a slight tribute to those he'd left behind.

Cedric. Sirius. His parents.

He looked up as he heard the door open, and sighed in frustration, taking out the ear buds and glaring at the person who had entered.

"What do you want," he asked vehemently. "I thought I told you already that I'm fine with living out the rest of my life and then going back."

"Oh, we know," the figure said. A long black cloak covered its body, and a dark hood obscured its face. "We just figured you could use a little help in doing that."

Harry frowned, before reaching into his pocket for his wand. It was then that he realised he'd left it on his bedside table in his rush that morning. He turned startled eyes to the cloaked figure, in time to see it raise its arm.

The sleeve of the cloak slipped down, revealing a feminine hand covered by a white glove. It made a strange, jerking movement, and Harry Potter flew across the room, smashing into a display of CDs and crashing to the ground. He did not get up.

The figure made another gesture, and Harry's body disappeared, along with the display stand and the wrecked CDs. It glanced around the room once, before exiting silently.

As it left the room, the figure vanished in a whirl of glittering dust.


	2. Chapter 1

**AN:/ Wow! I'm pleased that anyone actually read this story, but so many people! If you have the time, I'd be really pleased if you left a review, telling me what you liked about the story and how I could make it better.**

**I'm really sorry about the long wait, but I'm rushed off my feet with studying. I really need to get a good mark in English this year or I won't get into university!**

**Anyway... Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter; J K Rowling does. I don't own any recognisable muggle technologies; the appropriate companies do.**

**Claimer?: I do, however, own any characters you don't recognise from other franchises. I also own my own personal twist on Fae and Faetes (Or Fates if you prefer).**

...

Chapter One –Fae and Faetes

Harry blinked. A harsh light swung above him in a strangely elliptical curve, throwing strange shadows about the room and making his pounding head up the tempo to a steady drum roll.

Immediately he started taking stock of his situation. His hand immediately went to his eyes. He was startled to find that there were no glasses there, and he glanced around him, instinctively searching for them. His eyes roved over the potted plant in the corner of the room, took in the paintings on the wall, examined the pale wood of the arched doorway, and even had a full half-minute in which to search the sheets of the bed he was on before he realised that he could see clearly.

He was taking in everything around the room with crystal clarity, from the leaves and petals of the vibrant blue tulips to the muted greens and blues of Claude Monet's _Impressions, Sunrise_.

"Oh, _goody_! You have awoken!" a voice screeched from somewhere behind his left ear. He whirled, his arm coming up instinctively into a perfectly poised wand hold. Or at least, it would have, if he'd had a wand to be holding.

As he lowered his arm, he saw that the floating ball of light that had been hovering above him was now perched on the edge of the nightstand that had previously gone unnoticed. The light had dimmed considerably, allowing him to make out the form beneath.

It was rather like that of a young woman, about twenty or so years of age, apart from the fact that she was barely 3 inches tall. She had a reddish-brown hair colour, and her hair fell in front of her face, covering one of her eyes.

Harry blinked.

"Oh joyous day! You have awoken and are being not dead!" the girl – he supposed he'd just ignore the height difference – chirped from beside his right foot, which was still entangled in the sheets.

"Umm..." Harry replied vaguely, still trying to come to terms with the fact that actually, there was a diminutive woman standing next to – and nowhere near exceeding the height of – his right foot.

"We are ever so worried that you would be dead and not living. But you were awake and alive an-Aack!" she bubbled cheerfully, until she was knocked off the edge of the bed when Harry shifted to get a closer look at her.

"Sorry!" Harry cried, scrambling to the edge of the bed and peering over onto the floor. He quickly jumped back into the middle of the bed and pulled the sheets around himself however, when he felt a breeze in a normally concealed place and gathered he was naked.

"No need to be sorry! I was fine," the woman said as she fluttered over to the nightstand again. The sight of the green-and-orange iridescent wings sprouting from between her shoulder blades surprisingly calmed him. This wasn't a shrunken woman. He hadn't grown incredibly large overnight. He was merely in the presence of another magical creature.

"Umm... I don't mean to be rude... but... what..." Harry questioned awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck.

"What am I?" she chirruped. Harry nodded sheepishly. "My name is Teana. I am a Fae. The Fae are a race of magical creature that went dead a long time before in your world. We reside only here now."

"Where is here, exactly?" Harry pressed, scanning the room again.

"This is the Aether, guest! The place where all dead things reside," Teana smiled as she spoke, her cheerful tone not quite distracting Harry from what she'd just told him.

"What!" he cried, shock evident in his tone. "You mean I'm dead?"

"Oh no, silly guest. You have only visited this magical place. My masters wished to speak with you, and so they bring you here."

"And just who are your masters?" Harry asked, an unpleasant tingling at the back of his neck telling him he already knew the answer.

"Why, the Faetes, guest! They have been most pleased to see you. They are worried the transfer had turned sour," Teana bubbled, her cheery voice once again failing to mask the sinister words.

"Of course," Harry mumbled, his mind racing. The Faetes. The cloaked beings that had haunted his dreams since he'd returned from Hogwarts after Sirius' death. They'd made promises that they could fix his life; bring back those he'd lost.

He just had to die first.

He jerked up suddenly, realising that Teana was still talking.

"-she'll want to see you as soon as you woke up. Wake up. Have woken. Excuse me, would you mind telling me how to say that please?" she rambled, oblivious to her guests previous inattention.

"She wants to see me now?" Harry asked, unsure.

"Yes, that's it! Now. In the present. Presently. I'm afraid that we Fae have spent so long here out of contact with the world that we no longer knew the proper tenses to be used when we have talked. Anyway, follow me now and we will meet the one who summoned you," Teana concluded her speech with some sort of mid-air pirouette, before speeding off through the open doorway, once again resuming her bright light-like form.

_Well then, _Harry thought to himself, _time to finally meet these 'Faetes'.  
><em>...

After providing him with a set of clothes at his behest – a simple white cotton T-Shirt and dark grey tracksuit bottoms - Teana had led him down a seemingly endless corridor. Normal physics didn't seem to apply in this 'Aether', as when Harry glanced back to see how far he'd come, he found himself nose-to-cold marble with a solid wall. He turned back to the corridor, confused, and found himself facing the room come from about an hour or so before. Now utterly lost, he spun on the spot, watching as his surroundings seemed to go hazy around the edges for a moment before snapping back into focus as he stopped, now facing a lurid green door.

He heard a familiar chirpy voice call out from behind him, but, having learned his lesson, he did not turn. Instead, he called out behind him.

"Teana? I'm over here."

"How did you arrive here previously to me?" she asked, tilting her head as she examined him from her position near his left eye. Resisting the urge to swat her, he rolled his eyes.

"I turned around to-"

"Oh no! I forgot to explain," she cried, interrupting his explanation. "When you turn in this place, you have activated the backdoors. Only a trained professional should even attempted it."

Harry listened to her description of 'The Turning Point' – at least, that's what he thought she said – with one ear as he concentrated on the sign in front of him. In fancy calligraphy, the hand-painted sign read:-

_Death's Quarters – Do Not Enter With Life-Bearing Object On Pain Of Life_

"Teana?" Harry questioned suddenly, cutting off her explanation of proper turner technique. "What does it mean, 'On Pain Of Life'?"

"Oh, guest, please do not spoke of it!" Teana cried, her normally ecstatic voice wavering. "It is the curse of Life, guest! The Faetes only authorise it when you will be especially terrible. They take you, and they shoved you back into the mortal realm, never to see the Aether again until you have lived a full, mortal life."

"So, the worst punishment for the dead... is Life?"

"Oh yes, guest, most definitely. You are condemned to a hard, harrowing Life with no chance of a quick death. You will die of old age, no matter how many times you are trying to make it quicker."

"So why are we going in here then?" Harry asked, casting a wary look at the door, a little confused at the lack of a door handle. "Am I not a 'Life-Bearing Object'?"

"Yes! But you are gone in. I am not. Goodbye, guest. I hope your business ends well!" Teana replied, before shoving him with some sort of magical blast into – and straight through – the door.

He landed with a muffled 'thump' on the soft carpet of the room. Spitting wool fibres out of his mouth, he gathered his thoughts and looked around. The room was sparsely furnished, with only the thick red carpet and two black leather armchairs setting it apart from the corridor Harry knew lay beyond the door, which was now a deep blue.

One of the armchairs was occupied. The other was not. The figure in the first armchair gestured politely to the one opposite it, and Harry cautiously sat down. He recognised this person.

"You're the person who came to get me," he said accusingly, nodding at the white-gloved hand visible beneath the long sleeve of the cloak.

"Yes, I am," the figure replied, and Harry was shocked to hear the melodic, feminine voice that issued from beneath the cloak's hood. "You may call me Death."

Death pulled back her hood, and as she did the entire cloak seemed to melt off her, leaving her in a long black ball gown. She had an unremarkable face, which shifted between eye and hair colours almost imperceptibly; one moment a blue-eyed brunette sat opposite him, and the next a chocolate-eyed red-head was perched on the seat. There was no sudden change, no sudden realisation that she looked completely different; she just was, all the time.

She smiled at his curiosity, raising her non-gloved hand and making a broad sweeping gesture. In front of them, an old-fashioned bone china tea set now lay on a black leather pouf. As she busied herself making tea for both of them, Harry seized the opportunity and started asking her questions.

"What do you mean, exactly, when you say that you're 'Death'?"

Death sat back from the tea set, biting her bottom lip slightly as she pondered how to answer the question. "I am the Faete known as Death," she eventually replied, after passing him his own cup of steaming tea. "My job is to oversee the Life and Death cycle, along with my Partner, Life. We regulate who lives and who dies; when, where, how and why."

"So why did you bring me here? I can't offer you anything," Harry asked, confused as to why an all-powerful being such as this would stoop so low to get his help.

Death laughed an echoing, bell-like laugh that made the hairs on the back of Harry's neck stand on end. "Silly boy. It is not us who require you're help. It is you who require ours."

Harry started. All the memories of the dreams suddenly came flooding back to him. He now knew what Death and the other Faetes wanted him to do. He could only hope he was wrong.

"You killed me, didn't you?" he accused, glaring at the seemingly benign woman opposite him.

"It was for the best, dear. We need to fix the timeline, and you are our best candidate," Death explained gently. "If we can't fix it soon, the Faetes of Time, Memory, Life and I will cease to exist. You will live in a world outside of Time, with no Memory of how you got there. You will have no Death, but will not be able to live your Life. Do you see the problem now?"

"Yes. But, why are you meeting me, instead of all of you?"

"I was selected to be the representative to explain to you what needs to be done. After all, everyone knows there are Faetes worse than Death."


End file.
